Monday, January 13, 2014

This is pretty astonishing considering that it's not just any criminal gang and it's not just a couple of people but the whole operation:

An investigation by El Universal has found that between the years 2000 and 2012, the U.S. government had an arrangement with Mexico's Sinaloa drug cartel that allowed the organization to smuggle billions of dollars of drugs in exchange for information on rival cartels.

Sinaloa, led by Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman, supplies 80% of the drugs entering the Chicago area and has a presence in cities across the U.S.

There have long been allegations that Guzman, considered to be "the world’s most powerful drug trafficker," coordinates with American authorities.

But the El Universal investigation is the first to publish court documents that include corroborating testimony from a DEA agent and a Justice Department official.

The written statements were made to the U.S. District Court in Chicago in relation to the arrest of Jesus Vicente Zambada-Niebla, the son of Sinaloa leader Ismael "El Mayo" Zambada and allegedly the Sinaloa cartel’s "logistics coordinator."

So nobody considered that this cartel might have good reason to target its rivals and enjoy the protection of the US government while it rakes in hundreds of millions of dollars I guess. Of course not. This is simply one of those very clever law enforcement operations that make very little sense. But I'm sure their numbers looked damned good so there's that.